Florida execution is nation's third in 24 hours

Jun. 18, 2014
|

John Ruthell Henry was executed June 18, 2014, for killing his estranged wife and her son in 1985 near Plant City, Fla. Two years earlier, he was paroled after serving seven years for murdering his previous spouse. / Florida Department of Law Enforcement/AP

by Michael Winter, USA TODAY

by Michael Winter, USA TODAY

In the third execution nationwide in less than 24 hours, a three-time Florida murderer was put to death by lethal injection Wednesday night.

The execution of John Ruthell Henry was the state's 13th since April 2013 and the 18th since Gov. Rick Scott took office in 2011. The trio of executions Tuesday and Wednesday were the first since the botched lethal injection of an Oklahoma killer in April.

Henry, 63, was pronounced dead at 7:43 p.m. after being injected with three drugs at the Florida State Prison in Starke.

He was convicted in the 1985 stabbing deaths of Suzanne Henry and her 5-year-old son near Tampa. Two years earlier, he was paroled after serving seven years for brutally stabbing his girlfriend, Patricia Roddy, in 1976.

Wednesday, the U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals and the U.S. Supreme Court rejected Henry's pleas to delay the execution. His attorney argued he had a low IQ, was mentally disabled and therefore should not be put to death under the U.S. Constitution's ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

Henry refused his last meal and was described by a prison official as being calm hours before his death. He was injected with midazolam hydrochloride, vecuronium bromide and potassium chloride.

Murderers in Georgia and Missouri were executed late Tuesday and early Wednesday after a seven-week pause triggered by the botched lethal injection of Clayton Lockett in Oklahoma in late April.

Just before midnight Tuesday, Georgia executed 59-year-old Marcus Wellons for raping and murdering a 15-year-old girl in 1989. The state used pentobarbital, which was obtained for the first time from a loosely regulated compounding pharmacy. For the first time, the source of the drug was not disclosed.

Two hours later, Missouri used pentobarbital to execute 46-year-old John Winfield, who was convicted for the 1996 shooting spree that killed two women and blinded a third.